Windows 7 and netbooks: Separating fact from speculation

Even though Microsoft is trying to stir up excitement for Windows 7’s prospects on new (and most likely more expensive) multi-touch-enabled PCs, there is more interest among users and industry watchers around the next release of Windows running on netbooks. Microsoft officials demonstrated a full-fledged version (we don’t know which pre-beta build number) of Windows 7 running onan Asus Eee with 1 GB of RAM. Netbooks — which I’ll use here to refer to low-cost, low-end PCs capable of running email and a Web browser, but little else — are quickly becoming an increasingly large part of the overall PC market.